The chant is perhaps one of the most popular among Trump supporters, and it references his constituents’ demands to jail Clinton for her use of a private email server while she was secretary of state .
“You said about Hillary Clinton, ‘Lock her up.’ “You refused to do this as president,” Fox co-host Will Cain told Trump.
“I beat her,” Trump responded. “It’s easier when you win. And they always said to lock him up, and I felt – and I could have done it, but I felt it would have been a terrible thing. And then it happened to me.
Trump later claimed he never called for Clinton’s imprisonment.
“I didn’t say ‘lock her up,’ but people said lock her up, lock her up,” Trump said. “Then we won. And I said – and I said quite openly, I said, okay, come on, relax, let’s go, we need to make our country great.
However, there are several instances in which Trump agreed with Clinton’s calls for imprisonment.
In July 2016, for example, Trump said he would not be “Mr.” Nice Guy” when it came to Clinton, at a rally in Colorado where the crowd demanded Clinton’s incarceration.
“Every time I mention her, everyone screams, ‘Lock her up, lock her up,'” Trump told the crowd. “You know what, I’m starting to agree with you.”
In the weeks leading up to the 2016 election, Trump even said he would appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Clinton and seek to put her in prison for her use of the private email server.
But after his election in November. On December 9, 2016, Trump did not attack Clinton when, at a post-election rally, a crowd loudly chanted “Lock her up!” »
“Hillary worked very long and very hard for a long time and we owe her a tremendous debt of gratitude for her service to our country,” Trump said then. “I mean this very seriously. Now is the time for America to heal the wounds of division. …I say it is time for us to come together as one united people.
But the chants didn’t stop, even four years later, when Trump was running against another Democratic presidential candidate. In September 2020, Trump declared “I agree” during chants aimed at locking up Clinton.
After his conviction in New York, Trump found himself uncertain about whether he could face prison time. His legal team vowed to appeal the guilty verdict, and New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan set sentencing for July 11. Merchan, who oversaw Trump’s trial, will also decide his sentence. Potential penalties include up to four years in prison, house arrest, probation or a fine.